


Doing Christmas Right This Time

by Burning_Up_A_Sun



Series: Adult Education [6]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Christmas, Christmas Eve, Christmas Fluff, Divorced Lestrade, Florida, Jamms!Verse, Living Together, Mystrade fluff, Santa Claus - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-18
Updated: 2014-12-18
Packaged: 2018-03-02 01:47:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2795291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Burning_Up_A_Sun/pseuds/Burning_Up_A_Sun
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Christmas Eve in the Lestrade-Holmes home is gorgeous and funny, because Greg insists that, when you stop believing in Santa, you start getting underwear. But Anabelle (Greg's daughter) knows the truth. Santa is a fairy tale and Christmas sucks. Maybe this year, they'll Do Christmas Right This Time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Doing Christmas Right This Time

**Author's Note:**

> special thanks to DoctorsDaughter and 221btls for betaing this. When two betas tell you the same thing doesn't work, you had best cut that shit out. or at least down 300+ words. Love you both.
> 
> This is part of the JAMMS'Verse, meaning it's the Florida AU where many of my fics are set. You don't have to read them all to enjoy this one; I just hope you will anyway ;}
> 
> The title comes from one of my all time fav Christmas songs, Christmas Wrapping by The Waitresses, from 1981 at the very beginning of MTv https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2SzjDOk_u9I (as in, w/in months). so, no video.

“Have yourself a merry little Christmas,” Mycroft sang along to the CD, his trained voice filling the room as he draped strands of white lights over the boughs of their Christmas tree. “Let your heart be light.”

Judy Garland serenaded them as he and Greg decorated this ridiculous live tree he'd been badgered into buying. Greg and Belle dragged him to a Christmas tree farm, forced him to sit on stacks of hay in the back of a truck and sing carols. Belle even dared him to pet Santa's reindeer in the pen while she and Greg stood back and drank steaming cups of peppermint hot cocoa. They refused to believe him when he said Cupid almost bit his finger instead of the carrot. They tied the 7' Frasier fir to the top of Mycroft's car and he grudgingly sang along with the Christmas carols on the radio. Greg and Anabelle laughed and teased each other, and then teased him. He couldn’t recall the last time anyone loved him enough to tease him. Or take him on a hayride. Or introduce him to a reindeer. This was the best Christmas he’d had in 20 years.

“Faithful friends who are dear to us, gather near to us, once more.” Greg sang off-key and unaware of how terrible his voice was but with joy, bursting with love for his daughter and Mycroft.

He caught Mycroft's eye and shared a smile that said _I love you_ and _Merry Christmas_ and _When can we ditch the tree and the kid and slide between the sheets_?

Mycroft giggled at Greg's come-hither smile. Why had he spent years thinking Christmas was a waste of a perfectly good work day? Christmas was so beautiful. This song was so beautiful. He'd thought it sappy and soppy but it wasn't at all. His heart was light ever since he’d opened himself to Greg and to the possibility of love after years of being heartbroken and alone.

Greg held the string of lights as Mycroft wound them around the tree. “So they won’t tangle,” he said with a smile, but mostly he loved being this close to Mycroft. The flickering of the flames from the fireplace mingled with the soft white lights gave Mycroft an angelic glow. He looked much younger than usual, the stress lines and worried eyes replaced by twinkling and smiles.

Greg leaned in and rubbed his nose against Mycroft’s before stealing a kiss.

“Next year all our troubles will be out of sight.” Mycroft smiled shyly at Greg's kiss. They’d been together six months tonight, but he was never certain what Anabelle would say or think if he were demonstrative.

“S’ok,” Greg whispered near Mycroft’s ear. "I love you, and she knows that. Plus, in the four months we've lived together, she has walked in on us kissing more times than I care to remember."

Anabelle, who'd draped herself sideways in Mycroft’s well worn, leather armchair, pulled an earbud out of her ear. “I can hear you, you know,” she laughed and leaned her head around the back of the chair catching them mid-smooch. "You really suck at being discreet. I’m just sayin’.”

Greg grabbed a red and green salt dough decoration from the coffee table. “Quiet you, or else..." He held out the hand print she’d made 10 years ago when she was 6, as if he would ever drop something so precious.

“You know, Mycroft,” Anabelle said in a tone he’d come to fear. It was sweet and innocent and a trap. Always a trap. “If you need ornaments for that naked tree, I have an entire box of homemade ones--popsicle stick stars of David, construction paper Santas. I think I might even have a Kwanzaa mat ornament.”

Greg snorted at Mycroft’s grimace. The very thought of Popsicle sticks or construction paper gracing this tree…

“Thank you, Anabelle,” Mycroft answered, smiling at her before he went back to placing the lights just so on each branch or rearranging them until they were perfect. “Perhaps next year we will move from lights to adding ornaments."

"Can the lights at least blink?” she asked, mostly to watch Mycroft’s twitch as he tried to compromise on something that he was viscerally opposed to.

Mycroft was traditions. Worn leather chairs in front of a crackling fire and cashmere throws Anabelle thought as she braided the fringe on the end of the deliciously soft blanket. Her dad was new technology and webbed outdoor chairs and, beach blankets, damp and sandy. Somehow it worked really well, better than her dad and mom ever had.

These past four months--¬after Mamaw called Daddy and said she’d found a buyer for the house they’d been living in and Mycroft invited them to move in with him¬--had been perfect. Her dad and Mycroft spoke to each other with respect and love. And they laughed. She couldn't remember the last time her daddy had smiled before he met Mycroft.

Mycroft’s home¬ (No, she needed to remember it was their home) really was ridiculously perfect. The fire crackled in the stone fireplace, occasionally spitting orange embers onto the hearth. She watched them glow bright and burn out to black char. The flickering of the flames mingled with lights from the strands in the evergreen tree. It looked like an old-timey Christmas card.

"Mycroft, my love,” Greg sighed, as Mycroft removed and re-placed the same string of lights for the third time. “It’s ten minutes until midnight. If we don’t finish this tree soon, Santa won’t come, and you know how it is. No Santa, no presents.”

Greg smiled the big, sappy grin that parents always used when they talk about Santa, no matter how old the kid. God, Anabelle fucking hated that. She wasn’t a baby. She rolled her eyes at her dad. Before she could say anything, Mycroft stepped in.

“Gregory, Anabelle isn’t a child.” He wound the last of the strand to the top of the pine tree and slid the plug from the gossamer angel into the socket on the string of lights. The angel’s glow shone on the ceiling, casting a halo over Mycroft’s head. “Obviously she no longer believes in a myth created by parents as an artificial method of controlling their children.”

Greg stared at Mycroft, who’d stepped off the stool and pulled a linen handkerchief from the inner pocket of his suit jacket to wipe the pine sap from his fingers.

“That’s mighty cynical, my friend,” Greg warned. “You keep talking crazy like that, and the Big Man’s not gonna bring you any gifts.” Greg pointed to the empty space under the tree, as if to reinforce what it would look like tomorrow.

"We are all too old to believe in such fiction." Mycroft said and Anabelle nodded emphatically.

“Also, the only reason there are no gifts under the tree is because Anabelle made me solemnly swear not to." Mycroft raised an eyebrow, his expression saying _what’s that about_? Greg watched Anabelle's smile fall; he knew too well her concerns.

To change direction, Greg held his hands up in surrender. “Everyone believes in Santa at Christmas,” he said simply. "When you stop believing, you start getting underwear. Don’t blame me tomorrow morning when I get awesome gifts, and y’all get socks.” Greg folded the stepstool and stored it in the hall closet, mumbling about Grinches and the Burgermeister Meisterburger.

Mycroft smiled at Anabelle, who’d pulled the blanket up to her chin as if she were trying to hide. “I’m certain you will receive more than socks tomorrow, Belle,” he said. He’d seen Greg hide an iPhone 6 in his golf club bag. Mycroft himself had found a sealed Van Halen album to add to her vinyl collection. Thirty years old and still brand new. She would love it.

“Whatever. I stopped believing a long time ago,” Anabelle snarked, waving his kindness away and plugging her earbuds back in to shut them out. She saw Mycroft’s face fall. Dammit. He didn’t deserve her crap. It wasn’t his fault Christmas sucked. Belle rubbed her fist in a small circle on her chest, signing _I'm sorry_. Mycroft smiled and motioned outward from his chin. _Thank you_.

Anabelle pulled the blanket over her head and finally gave in to the memories that had been nipping at the edge of her mood all evening. She’d tried ignoring them, but they wouldn’t go away.

_The year I stopped believing in Santa, everything fell apart. Yeah, the cookies for Santa and the carrots for the reindeer were gone in the morning, but I knew it was my parents._

_Daddy said if you don't believe, you get boring, practical gifts. All I wanted was a Carlos Pena signed first baseman’s glove, oiled and ready to use for baseball season. I told everyone how much I wanted that glove. I got a training bra. With a tiny pink bow. Mom squealed with a happy little clap about her baby becoming a little lady. Daddy was right._

_There was one more gift at the back of the tree. A small box, the size you get from a jewelers. The gift tag said, To: Jennifer From: Santa. Mom tore the expensive gift wrap off, and Lake Park Jewelers was embossed on top of the small, square box. "Jewelry! You shouldn't have!" she squealed. I knew from Daddy’s face that he hadn’t._

_She gasped. Even at 10, I knew the diamond earrings were stunning._

_Someone had written 'Please Marry Me’ inside the box. Which was really confusing to me, because she was married. To my dad._

_It turns out that, when you carpool to work with your secret boyfriend, and he comes into the house every morning, you shouldn’t leave him alone in the living room where he can sneak a gift under the tree because you won’t answer him when he asks you too many times to leave your family and move to Atlanta with him._

_Daddy sent me to my room in a creepy, calm voice I’d never heard before. My mom slammed the front door on her way out. My dad disappeared into their bedroom. Later I snuck out to make myself a sandwich, but I went right back in case the fight started again._

_Before I went to bed, my dad came into my room. I cried on his shoulder, and he cried into mine. “It’s my fault because I don't believe in Santa,” I said. He said it wasn't me, but I knew. I’d wrecked everything. Christmas was never as good as it was when you believed in Santa._

Slowly, someone pulled the blanket from my head. Daddy. Smiling radiantly. Joyous.

“I know what you're thinking," Greg said, reading her face and mind. "It was never you. It was your mom and me. We didn't belong together. We¬—“ he stopped and corrected himself, “I made a lot of mistakes. But this," Greg looked over his shoulder to Mycroft, who was carefully tucking the plastic bags back into the boxes from the new lights he’d bought for the tree. When he realized they were looking at him, Mycroft smiled, glowing and not simply from the delicate white lights and the flames. “We’re doing Christmas right this year. We’re good together. I really love him.” He grinned and looked away, feeling like he was 16 again.

“I do too, Daddy.” Belle stood up from her comfortable chair and hugged him tight. “I¬ know you never thought you’d be with a guy. But you are so much happier than I’ve ever seen you.” She kissed his cheek and wrapped him in a squeezy hug.

As he released her, belle asked her dad, "what are the chances there'll be a TV under the tree?” Mycroft had given up his comfortable leather armchair to her. He’d given up his cashmere blanket to her, with the promise that she took great care of it. Yet he remained unyielding to wheedling and cajoling designed to bring him into television age.

“I hope you asked Santa,” Greg shook his head. “No way in hell he’s giving in.” He jerked his thumb toward Mycroft, who’d just settled onto the couch.

The grandfather clock chimed 12 times. “Merry Christmas, baby. It’s time for little girls to go to bed.” Greg kissed Anabelle’s forehead and hugged her one final time.

Anabelle dropped a kiss on Mycroft’s head to say good night. The clang-jangle of Mycroft's cell phone interrupted them. The three of them stared at Mycroft’s suit jacket, meticulously hung over the back of the rocking chair. Mycroft’s face fell. He had no desire to deal with Queen and Country this night, and worse, he would be prohibited from discussing the call. Neither Greg nor Anabelle ever pushed him, but when the phone with the distinctive antique-phone rang, they knew Mycroft would disappear, sometimes for hours on end.

“I’m so sorry,” Mycroft said, touching Greg’s face with his fingertips for a moment, before answering and walking out of the room.

“I’m going to make some tea,” Greg said, his voice sadder than it had been. “It’s going to be a long night for him. You go to bed, baby. Good night.”

He passed through the French doors, leaving Anabelle alone with the sinking feeling that Christmas sucked. Tomorrow morning when she woke up, Mycroft would probably be gone on a ‘business trip’ again.

She held her hands out to the fireplace, warming her body and her chilly nose. Behind her she could hear the angry almost-whistle of the tea and Daddy setting up the serving tray. Usually, he'd take it into the study, knocking quietly and leaving it behind with a blown kiss.

Tonight, she heard him placing the heavy tray on the coffee table in front of the sofa. She turned to ask if Greg wanted her to take the tray to the study. Her voice froze. Her entire body froze.

Bright red suit. White fur. White beard, red cheeks. Unbidden, words she memorized years ago for a holiday play, flew through her memory:

**His eyes¬, how they twinkled! his dimples, how merry!**   
**His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!**   
**His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,**   
**And the beard on his chin was as white as the snow.**

There.  
Is.  
No.  
Such.  
Thing.  
As.  
Santa.

“Holy shit, Mycroft,” she laughed when she realized what was going on. “That’s a pretty realistic costume. You really got me good.”

“My stars, young Anabelle,” Santa said. “Such language doesn’t befit you, especially not on the best night of the year.”

“Oh, ok, I’ll play along,” she laughed as she approached him. _Damn. He put in friggin’ blue contacts for this_ , she thought as she looked into his face. _That is serious commitment to fooling me_. “That’s some belly you got there, Santa. Looks like you need a few more laps around the reindeer pen.”

Santa laughed loud and long, his white gloves a contrast against the red fur jacket over his belly; she felt the joyful rumble in her soul. “Don’t I just. Mrs. Claus always bakes too many cookies and how can I resist?”

“Same.” Anabelle agreed. Mycroft was brilliant. This costume. The phone call. Dad in the kitchen, leaving her alone. Ridiculous. “What’s with just appearing and not using the chimney?” This would be good. Watch him squirm his way out of this mistake.

“Anabelle, you are much too smart to ask that question. This suit is not fireproof.” Santa ran his hands down his side with a flourish, accenting his outfit. “Since I’ve finished with the gifts, and you were kind enough not to put out any food for me,” he belly laughed again as he pointed to his overly large belly, “I must be off. Those stockings in Hawaii aren’t going to fill themselves! Mele Kalikimaka!” Santa said with a wink. He leaned in closer and said earnestly, "Anabelle, don’t let people convince you I’m not real. I’ve always heard your heart, even when your mind said you didn’t believe.”

Santa blew her a kiss, which she returned with a beaming smile. God Bless Mycroft for going through so much trouble.

Santa spun on his heel and before her eyes, he disapparated with his bag over his shoulder, leaving no trace that he’d been there.

“That was blessedly short,” Mycroft sighed as he opened the door of his study. “Your music was quite loud Belle. I could hear it through the closed door.”

“Not…not…no I--” Her feet were glued in place. She. She twisted from the study door to the spot in front of the tree where Santa had stood and then disappeared.

“Hey, handsome. You’re done with your call,” Greg said, seeing Mycroft in his doorway. “I made us some tea, but if you want we can skip the foreplay--” at which point Greg saw a stunned Belle standing by the tree. “I thought you went to bed. What's going on? You look like you saw a ghost.”

“Mycroft was Santa, and he talked to me, but he was in his study and then he disappeared but he was right here.” She babbled, trying to find logic.

“Honey, did you fall asleep in the chair while I was making tea?” Greg asked, feeling her forehead for a fever.

“Sounds more like she hit my liquor cabinet,” Mycroft giggled, not a low, booming laugh but a high titter.

“No, I swear, Santa was here, and he was hacked off because we had the fire going, and because he’s fat because Mrs. Claus makes too many cookies.”

_Don’t let anyone convince you I’m not real, he’d said._

“I need to sit down,” Belle said, and sank to the floor, her mouth open but her eyes twinkling with the joy of the truth.

“Thanks for putting the gifts out, hon,” Greg said to Mycroft, pointing under the tree. “Did you get the special one out of my golf bag?”

“No, you put them out while I was on the phone,” Mycroft countered. “I thought we agreed we were going to have a small Christmas this year,” he said, as he silently counted the many packages under the tree.

“Santa.” Was all Anabelle could say. “Santa did it.”

Greg sat on the couch and motioned for Mycroft to sit next to him. He poured each of them a cup of tea. “Belle, you told us when you were 10 that Santa wasn’t real.” He returned from the kitchen with one extra cup and saucer for Belle, who should have been in bed.

“I was wrong. I was so wrong,” she said, her eyes blazing with truth. “Santa is real. And he always knows what’s in your heart. I’d been praying for you to find someone Daddy, someone who would love you and cherish you. And look at you two.”

Greg leaned over and kissed Mycroft, entwining their fingers. “You are an excellent Christmas gift," he said, stroking his thumb on the ginger stubble.

“I don’t know what this new found passion is about Santa, but as long as we’re together and someone put the gifts under the tree, shall we open them now and sleep in tomorrow?” Mycroft asked.

Each gift was perfect. New running clothes and shoes for Greg, the exact brand he wanted and the size he wore. A snorkel and mask for Mycroft, who’d mentioned several times how much fun he’d had as a child when his family had gone snorkeling in the Caribbean. They thanked each other with hugs, but as Belle watched them, she clearly thought that neither knew what the other was talking about.

A large box had Belle’s name on it. She tore through the paper and slit the tape to find another wrapped box inside. She tore through that paper and slit the tape on the box to find ANOTHER wrapped inside. Each box was successively smaller until a box, the perfect size for a tie or silk scarf lay at the bottom. Afraid of what this would hold, Anabelle carefully unwrapped the package. Before she lifted the top off the box, she looked at Greg and Mycroft for any clues. Their faces were blank.

“OH. MY. GOD. Disney Cruise tickets! FOUR of them” Anabelle squealed and threw herself at both men at the same time. “One for you,” she handed a ticket to Greg. “One for you,” she handed a ticket to Mycroft. “One for me, and OH MY GOD, ONE FOR MAGGIE!” she immediately snapped a picture with her iPhone and sent it off to her best friend. “You guys are amazing. I love you!” Her phone pinged; obviously, Maggie was still awake, too.

“Uh, Belle,” Greg said. “Those aren’t from me.” He left the room and returned with a small box. “This is.” He handed her his gift. She tore into it and squealed at her new phone.

She assumed the cruise tickets were from  
Mycroft, but he cleared that up. "I'm Sorry, princess. Not from me. Wasn’t there a tag on the box?”

Anabelle searched the torn paper. “To the Lestrade-Holmes. From Santa.”

“Could it be from your mother and father?” Greg asked.

“Could it be from John and Sherlock?” Mycroft asked at the same time.

“I’m telling you, it was Santa.” Anabelle explained again, sitting in a sea of torn wrapping paper.

Mycroft excused himself and returned from his study with a small, thin box. Bigger than the box the tickets came in, but smaller than a computer. “Anabelle, this is for you.” He handed her the box but held onto the envelope.

With another squeal (Mycroft made a mental note to take Tylenol before Belle’s birthday party in February to ward off the inevitable squealy headache.), Belle tore open the wrapping. “An iPad Air 2! Daddy look! I can synch it with my new phone!”

“Please. Please. Please,” Mycroft begged as he handed her the envelope. “Please stop asking me.” Inside the envelope was a cable television channel guide.

“Did you--” She asked, her mouth agape.

“Yes. Cable television. You can access it through your new iPad. That's the closest thing to a television I will have in this house." He tried to sound stern, but found it too difficult with Belle’s arms wrapped around his neck.

“Love you,” she whispered to him for the first time and he hugged her just a bit tighter.

When all the gifts had been dug out from under the tree and distributed, with hugs and kisses all around (and a whispered promise of something waiting in the bedroom that she wasn’t supposed to hear), Mycroft declared it time for bed.

“What’s that at the back of the tree?” Greg asked, angling his head to get a better look. “It’s not from me.”

“It’s not from me,” Mycroft said, equally puzzled

She knew their expressions better than they knew themselves; it really wasn’t from them. Belle's stomach ran cold. Not again.

She slithered under the tree and found the oddly-shaped, lumpy present wrapped in grass-green paper.

_To Belle. Finally. Love, Santa._

Finally? Her heart beat much too fast as she opened the bumpy, squishy gift.

“OhmygodOhmygodOh.My.GOD Look Daddy. Look.” Anabelle waved a brand new first baseman’s glove, well-oiled and broken in. She had told no one that she was going to try out for the boys’ baseball team this spring, not even Maggie. “He heard me when I was 10. He knew. He knew I never stopped wanting it,” Anabelle said through her happy tears.

“Who, baby?” Greg asked her, wiping the tears from her cheeks with his thumb.

“Santa. I thought he was you or Mycroft, but he was real. He was here tonight. I talked to him.” Anabelle laughed as she said it. She knew she sounded ridiculous. “I have to go tell Maggie!” With final hugs and kisses and thanks for her beautiful gifts, Anabelle headed to bed.

Finally alone, Greg wrapped his arms around Mycroft’s waist, his hands drifting lower. With a small squeeze, he said, “Let’s go to bed, so I can thank you properly for the cruise and the baseball glove.” He brushed his lips against Mycroft’s, nipping at them as he pulled Mycroft closer. “Not only are you wise and cunning, you’re also really, really hot.”

“God yes, bed,” Mycroft said in between kisses, rolling is hips against Greg. “But I really didn’t buy the cruise. Or the glove. I thought you did.”

Greg broke apart. “Of course you it was you. Don’t tease me.” He stared Mycroft down, waiting for him to confess.

“I really didn’t, Gregory. What reason do I have to lie?” Mycroft said. “You don't suppose Anabelle was right...“ He looked around the living room for evidence to the contrary. All he found were a few black scuff marks on the hardwood floor—marks that hadn’t been there earlier.

“I honestly don’t know,” Greg said, his voiced measured and low. “I’d always hoped he was real—especially this year, because I’ve got you.” A flush crept up Greg’s neck, embarrassed for being mushy.

Mycroft reached out to Greg, cupping his face. Slowly, gently, he kissed Greg, leaving his eyes open. He couldn't pull his eyes away from this he'd been given.

In the distance they heard the faint sound of sleigh bells blessing their love.

“No!” they said and raced out the back door. In the bright cloudless night, with shimmering stars dotting the sky, they saw a dark object flying away.

“Probably a drone,” Mycroft said, his voice unsure. He took Greg’s hand in his.

“Weather balloon,” Greg offered, not believing his own words. He squeezed Mycroft’s hand, to ensure neither of them were dreaming this incredible vision.

And they heard Him exclaim as He drove out of sight, “Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night.”

**Author's Note:**

> http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/171924 This is the text of A Visit from St. Nicholas (Twas the Night Before Christmas), which I have borrowed from ;)


End file.
